Chapter I: Eben Makes Up His Mind

"THE long and the short of it is, mother, I must just go to work and earn my living the best way I can," said Eben Fairchild, straightening himself up so as to make the most of his not many feet in height; "and if I can't do what I want to do, why, I must just do what I can."

"It does seem a very hard case," said Mrs. Fairchild, sighing. "Your father's plans for you were so very different."

"He wanted you to have an education, you know," said Flora Fairchild, Eben's sister. "He said to Mrs. Willson, that very last day he was here, that ever since you came to us he had quite set his heart on your going to college."

"I know it," returned Eben, "but there is no use in talking about that now. I cannot afford to go to school, and I am not going to live upon mother so long as I have strength and sense to help myself."

"If your father had only not signed those notes, it would have been all right," said Mrs. Fairchild, wiping her eyes. "He was not under the least obligation to Mr. Furness, either, but that was Mr. Fairchild's only fault. He never knew how to say 'No.'"

Eben patted his foot on the floor rather impatiently.

"We know pa did it for the best," said Flora, "and, anyhow, it is done, and can't be undone."

"I know that as well as you do," returned Mrs. Fairchild, with a kind of mild impatience, "and I'm sure I don't want to find any fault with Mr. Fairchild, especially now that he is dead and gone, but I can't help wishing that it was different. Mr. Fairchild always looked upon your brother Eben as just as much our own child as yourself, and so have I, I am sure; and I can't help feeling disappointed that he can't have an education, as we always meant he should;" and Mrs. Fairchild took out her handkerchief and indulged in a "weep," while Eben looked steadfastly out of the window, and Flora ran her sewing machine at such a furious rate that she broke her needle, and had to stop to put in a new one. Mrs. Fairchild had a wonderful talent for "misunderstanding," and her children knew by long experience that any attempt to set her right only made matters ten times worse.

"And even supposing that you do give up going to college, and go to work, what will you find to do?" asked Mrs. Fairchild, presently.

"That is just what I must go to work and find out," replied Eben. "If I can't do one thing, I must just do another; it won't do to be too particular, so long as the work is honest and profitable enough to support me. I shall go down to the mill and talk to Mr. Antis, and to Jeduthun Cooke, and see what they can do for me. That is the first step. If I can get a place in the mill, I shall be fixed right away; I couldn't wish for anything better than that."

"You wouldn't want to go to work under that coloured man!" exclaimed Mrs. Fairchild.

"I should have been pretty badly off now if it hadn't been for that coloured man," returned Eben, with more impatience than he had showed hitherto. "What would have become of me if Jeduthun hadn't come in and taken my part as he did?"

"I wish you wouldn't be always going back to that time, Eben Fairchild," said his mother. "I don't see, for my part, what pleasure you find in it. I am sure Mr. Fairchild and I have always treated you exactly as if you were our own, and tried to have you feel so, and yet you are always bringing up the time when you lived with your uncle. I don't see how you can."

"Oh dear!" said Flora, under her breath.

"I am sure I never forget what you and pa have done for me," replied Eben, recovering his good humour, "but you know you would never have known anything about me, only for Jeduthun."

"That's true," said Mrs. Fairchild, "and you always have been a great comfort to us, Eben, I will say that, and Mr. Fairchild said the same, the very day he died, to Mr. Willson. 'Eben has always been a comfort to us from the day we took him in,' says he, 'and he is an uncommonly persevering boy,' says he, 'and the most faithful boy to do what he undertakes. I have always meant that Eben should have a good education.' Those were your dear pa's very words, and I know he wouldn't like you to go to work in the mill under Jeduthun Cooke, though I don't deny that he thought a great deal of Jeduthun, and so do I, a great deal, but, after all, it doesn't seem just the thing for you to be working under him."

"But, ma, just look here," said Eben, sitting down to the table; "don't you see how it is? To go to college I must go to school at least two years longer, and have all my time to study. Then, I couldn't get through college for less than two hundred and fifty dollars a year, at the least calculation. Four times that is one thousand dollars. Pa left us, after the farm and stock were disposed of, just this little house and garden, and a thousand dollars. That is the amount of our property. Now, how is a college education to come out of that?"

"Well, Flora has got her sewing machine. To be sure, it isn't all paid for, but then it will be pretty soon, and then all she makes will be clear gain, and there is the cow!"

"Flora wants all she can earn for herself and you," said Eben. "I shouldn't feel right to be living on her."

"Oh, well, manage it your own way," said Mrs. Fairchild. "I dare say you children think you know best, though Mr. Fairchild always said I had a good mind. Oh, if he had only taken my advice as to signing those notes! But he never said one word to me about it, till the last minute. You must manage it your own way; only I am sorry, when your father's head was so set on your having an education, and I am sure it might be managed somehow."

"There is Mrs. Brown coming in, mother," said Eben. "Hadn't you better take her into the front room? It is warm there, and the machine makes such a noise."

The moment her mother left the room, Flora stopped her machine, laid her head down on her arms, and cried, not mildly, like Mrs. Fairchild, but passionately and with a kind of fierceness. Flora had a great deal of force about her, and it came out in all she said and did.

"Don't, Flossy," said Eben, in a hoarse and altered tone; "I can't bear it! You must help to cheer me up."

"Well, I won't," said Flora, raising her head and wiping her eyes, "but oh, Eben, how can she go on so?" and in spite of herself, as it seemed, her head went down again.

"Ma isn't herself lately," said Eben. "I never saw anybody so changed. Sometimes I think she would be better if she had more to do. But never mind, Flossy. We must just think how good she is, and not mind her little ways. Come, Flossy, don't sew any more now. Come down to the bottom of the garden with me, and let us have a nice quiet talk while ma is busy with Mrs. Brown. You will break more needles than your work is worth if you go on sewing as you feel now."

"I believe you are right," said Flora, "and yet I ought not to lose any time."

"Resting is not losing time," persisted her brother, "and if you lame your back at the first start, you won't be able to do any more. Don't you know the lady in the sewing machine store cautioned you against that very thing?—against working too steadily just at first? I know you will sew all the better for resting a little while."

Flora suffered herself to be persuaded. She covered her machine, laid aside her work, and followed Eben down the path to the end of the garden, where he had found time to make a pretty seat. The garden of Mrs. Fairchild's new home extended down to the bank of the little river which ran through the village of Boonville. It was a pretty, rippling, prattling stream, turning mill wheels all along its course, but never seeming to have its nature troubled or its spirit affected by its work. A large willow hung over the water, and under this, Eben had placed his seat, though Mrs. Fairchild declared that she should never dare to sit there, because she remembered just such a tree at her grandfather's which always had red-headed caterpillars in it in July, and she should always think they were crawling over her.

Undeterred in June by the visions of the red-headed caterpillars of past Julys, Eben laid an old shawl on the seat for his sister's accommodation, and placing himself at her feet on a convenient stone, he sat some few minutes in silence, apparently watching the minnows in the water.

"Well?" said he, at last, seeing that Flora did not speak.

"Well?" said Flora, rousing herself from what seemed a reverie. "Have you quite made up your mind, Eben?"

"There don't seem to be any special need of making up my mind in this case," said Eben, still looking at the water. "It seems to be made up for me. It is perfectly plain—to me at least—that it is my duty to go to work and earn my own living, and when you see your duty, do it. That is my notion. The more you go squirming about trying to get rid of it, the harder it will come at last."

"I know it, and yet, oh, Eben, I can't bear it!" exclaimed Flora, passionately. "I did so want to have you go to college, and it all seemed so plain, and now—Can't we manage it somehow? Or don't you really care, after all? Sometimes I think you don't, you are so cool about it."

"Flossy!" said Eben.

"Well, there! I am a wretch, I know," said Flora, penitently. "I know you do care, and you are giving it all up for us."

"I would give—no, not my right hand, but sometimes I think I would give my right foot to follow out father's plan and go to college," said Eben. "Ever since I first came here, when I was a little fellow seven years old, I have heard father talk about my having a good education, and I made up my mind three years ago just what I wanted to do. I meant to be a doctor, like Doctor Henry over at the Springs. But now, Flossy, just let us look the thing squarely in the face."

"Well, if you like, though I don't know what good it will do. I have looked at it till I am sick."

"It isn't as bad as it might be," said Eben. "We have a roof over our heads, a good garden, and a cow, besides our little capital in money. Then you have your machine, which you have learned to run nicely, and you seem likely to have plenty of work, so that when your machine is once paid for, all you make will be clear gain. All that is very nice, and then we all have our health, which is better still. But then there is the other side. We cannot three of us live on the interest of a thousand dollars, and what comes out of the garden and your machine. We can't live on it, let alone any notion of saving money for college expenses."

"You would not have to go to college for two or three years," argued Flora. "Your schooling would not cost much, and matters might come round in three years."

"They might, but they wouldn't," said Eben, shrewdly. "Things don't come round, as I see. You have got to move them, and shake them about, and rub off the corners, and make them round. Besides, how should I look or feel—a great stout boy fifteen years old—going to school and living on you and mother? I should be ashamed to look any one in the face. No, no, Flossy, I have got to do my duty, as I said. If I am to have an education, if He sees it's right that I should have one," he added, reverently, "he will bring it about. I have asked him to guide me, and make me decide rightly, and I believe he has done so—I believe I see my way clear."

Flora was silent. Her brother had got on ground where she could not follow him. Presently, however, she said, "You talk just like Alice Brown. I would give anything to feel so, but I can't. However, I do believe you are right, and as you say, if you have made up your mind, the sooner you set about it the better. I know very well, when I think it over, that it will be all I can do to keep myself and mother. She cannot understand any reason why she should not have all she ever had. If only she would not talk so about pa! It makes me feel as if I should go crazy sometimes."

"You must try and have patience, Flossy," said her brother, tenderly. "I know it is trying, but remember she has always been a good, kind mother to us, and I am sure she loved my father dearly and respects his memory. But I am going up to the mill now, and I will take my fishing-tackle along. Perhaps I can get a pickerel for supper. Don't go into the house just yet. Sit here and read, and let the old machine slide for the rest of the afternoon."